About this blog

Hi there! My name is Viktoria, and I'm a native Russian speaker, dividing her time between Saint-Petersburg, Omsk and Moscow. I love many things, and writing is amongst them. Not only I love writing in Russian, I want to learn how to write fiction literature in English. Also I plan to move to New Zealand on August 15 (2013) so English will soon become my main language of interaction. Therefore, this blog.

I'll try to write daily a little something about moving to New Zealand, and also about writing. Feel free to tell me when I make mistakes. I mean it! :-)

Sunday, 30 June 2013

This Friday I resigned from work. Which means that starting tomorrow I'm officially between jobs for the longest period in my life since I was 17. Well, actually there were few periods when I didn't go to work for more than a month, but those were not official, I was paid by the hour back then, and I was deeply depressed, so I couldn't really enjoy not having to work for more than two weeks straight.

Don't get me wrong, I don't hate work in general, and I definitely don't hate my job. It's just that I'm easily bored, and I often want to do stuff that I can't do while I'm on a day job. And though I have to do lots of organization right now to prepare to leave to Omsk, and then to Auckland, that still gives me more or less free schedule. And what do I do with it? Well, I procrastinate, of course! I hope this is just a temporary reaction to being jobless and not having to go anywhere. I gave myself today to do absolutely nothing, and I'm already a little bit sick of it. So, next week hopefully would be much more productive.

Aside from preparing to leave Saint Petersburg, these are my plans: I want to bring a little bit of organization into my everyday life. I want to start doing my 30 minutes of everyday writing at last. And some thoughtful reading too (already doing it). I have to significantly re-edit my article about testing to have it published on "Testing Planet". And I need to freshen my skills and knowledge in testing, and to dig into automation. I need my skills to be up to date in order to have better chances of finding a great job in Auckland. Because I want a great job, an interesting job where I wouldn't be easily bored, which would be a challenge, which would let me feel I'm making a difference.

I also want to try one more time to actually finish something on coursera. Problem with coursera is you better have a stability in your life when you go there. In my case there is no stability whatsoever, mainly because I'm bad in having it, but partly because of all the immigration story. I feel that now is my chance to establish some kind of stability. Not a self-made strict schedule, but something like a set of habits/rithuals to create a comfortable place in my life and in my mind. Some ways to be happy and proud of myself.

Of course it never works out the way I want it, but it gets better every time, and that's enough for the moment being.

Tuesday, 11 June 2013

It's been a while, I know... There's lots of news I can share.

First of all, I got New Zealand residence visa! It's not in my passport yet, but I got it in principal, which is awesome. Two days ago I returned from my one week vacation in Prague, and now I'm in a business trip in Moscow for another week... and after I finally return to Saint Petersburg, I'll have two more weeks of work in Yandex, one week to pack and free my appartment, about a month in my home city Omsk, and then - Auckland, Auckland, here I come!

Still, I need to send my passport to London and to get it back before leaving Saint Petersburg, and I'll need to buy tickets after that. All in all this is a very busy time.

Prague was awesome. I think it was my best vacation yet - with my dear friend, great food, beautiful towns, cozy bookshops, misteries and challenges, art and fun. I wish we had spent more time there. A month at least! Week is too small, you just start to get knowing the city, and you must leave the next day. So sad.
Also, Karlovy Vary is a perfect place to have a writer's vacation - i.e. a vacation to write a book. It's beautiful, slow and dull. D.U.L.L. Dull. You would write if only because there is nothing else to do. No distractions. Especially if internet is out of question, and honestly, internet must be out of question for the most time, or nothing would be ever done. Smart black hole is smart.

Moving on... I didn't have a month in Karlovy Vary, but I did have two evenings of writing my story. It's now 8668 words long, and my friend read it and liked it. She's the only person on Earth besides me who read a plan of the book and unfinished draft of the actual story. Of course there is an enormous amount of work left, but I move forward step by step... and she liked it. She said it is an interesting story. Of course, she is my friend, but this is exactly why I can trust her to tell me the truth.

Oh, and I also got tumblr. I'll fill it by random instagram reposts, quotes I like and posts from this blog. Let's see if that format would be comfortable.